Free speech the loser in new censorship push

The idea that an elected politician could order investigations into opinions they don’t agree with has no place in a democracy.

OPINION

Last November, Labor withdrew its previous Misinformation Bill in disgrace. It was an attack on free speech, and one of the worst pieces of legislation ever put forward by an Australian government.

For the last 10 months, the Albanese government has been working on changes to the original Misinformation Bill.

But the new bill has many of the same problems as the first one.

Under the bill, if digital platforms don’t remove views that are “misinformation”, they can face massive fines. The government regulator ACMA still decides whether or not digital platforms are doing enough to remove misinformation.

The digital platforms would much rather censor the political views of Australians than take the risk that they will get fined millions of dollars.

Labor’s proposed misinformation bill would give communications minister Michelle Rowland extraordinary powers. Picture: NewsWire / Martin Ollman

So what they will do?

If there is a risk of something being described as “misinformation”, they will censor it. That means that many of the statements made by ordinary Australians will be taken down.

Under the new Misinformation Bill, Communications Minister Michelle Rowland has the power to personally order investigations. There is nothing to stop the minister ordering an investigation into a digital platform if she believes that it contains “misinformation” on a particular topic.

Questioning economic policy could also fall afoul of misinformation laws. Photo by: NCA Newswire / Gaye Gerard

Incredibly, the minister also has the power to order public hearings into “misinformation”. These investigations and hearings can be on any “misinformation” topic determined by the minister. The potential for abuse of this power is obvious.

The idea that an elected politician could order investigations into opinions they don’t agree with has no place in a democracy. It is extraordinary that the Albanese government thinks that this should become the law of Australia.

For something to be misinformation under the bill, it doesn’t have to be malicious or designed to cause harm. It can be an honestly held opinion. The definition of what can be “misinformation” is so broad that it could capture thousands of things that Australians say every day.

For instance, something can be misinformation if it is capable of causing “imminent harm to the Australian economy”.

When you think about it, that would capture just about every ­economic policy the Greens have ever announced.

But the answer to dealing with bad ideas is not to prohibit them from being published. The answer is to defeat them with better arguments. After all, that’s how democracy works. And we are one of the world’s greatest democracies.

The bill does not apply to some groups of people, but it does apply to ordinary Australians.

This creates a situation which is obviously unfair. University lecturers are exempted, but not everyday Australians. So imagine there was a disagreement online between an academic and somebody who is not an academic. Anything the academic says is OK, and can’t be misinformation.

But if somebody disagrees with the academic, what they say can be censored as misinformation.

How is that fair?

The same applies to comedians.

Under Labor’s Misinformation Bill, if a comedian says something for the purpose of “parody or satire”, it cannot be misinformation. But an ordinary person who disagrees with the comedian can have their opinion censored as misinformation.

The exact same words could be misinformation if said by an ordinary person, but not misinformation if said by an academic or comedian. This is completely illogical, and offends against the basic democratic idea that we are all equal before the law.

The bill will have a wide reach across the internet.

Thousands of web sites will be captured by the law, and they will all be liable for fines if they don’t do enough to remove misinformation.

Podcasters are included in the bill. So they will need to check whether or not something might be seen as “misinformation” before putting it to air.

That will obviously have a chilling effect on the free and frank exchange of views online.

Our democratic freedoms are ­precious, and must be preserved. The Albanese government’s Misinformation Bill is a clear threat to those freedoms.

David Coleman is shadow communications minister